


said you’re coming back home, boy, don't feel so alone

by jublis



Series: blackbox [5]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Autistic Kageyama Tobio, Brother-Sister Relationships, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Introspection, M/M, Pre-Canon, Pre-Slash, SO, Team as Family, art is subjective but kagehina is NOT sit down and eat ur fruit, can u interpret the kagehina as platonic? yes, i Will make you cry im sorry, kageyama is the resident angst man but hes allowed to do that, mostly!, sorry tobio im making out w ur sister rn, the last three are kinda only there in spirit, this is actually a love letter to kageyama miwa disguised as a character study, will you be wrong? also yes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:15:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27303988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jublis/pseuds/jublis
Summary: The ball rolls gently on the ground, all the way to Tobio’s feet. He bends down to pick it up, and something in his blood sizzles like lightning. He looks at the leathery surface, then at his sister’s wild smile and neat hair; looks back at the court and the net, where the boys are running a spiking practice. Everyone else seems focused on the attackers, but Tobio’s eyes are zeroed on the one tossing. Set, connect, spike.Bang-bang-bang.No one wins without the setter.Tobio tosses the ball to Miwa and says, “Again.”Or, Kageyama Tobio grows up, older, and not that much wiser at all. Featuring brothers and sisters, anger, connection, and that moment when someone finally catches up with you.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou & Kageyama Tobio, Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio, Kageyama Kazuyo & Kageyama Tobio, Kageyama Miwa & Kageyama Tobio, Kageyama Tobio & Karasuno Volleyball Club, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Sawamura Daichi/Sugawara Koushi
Series: blackbox [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1988422
Comments: 39
Kudos: 200





	said you’re coming back home, boy, don't feel so alone

**Author's Note:**

> so hi hello yes. another one!! if you're new to this series - you can definitely read this as a standalone. my works here don't have any chronological order...but they do compliment each other in other ways. feel free to read the rest if you want :D
> 
> anyways, this was. fun. sad. angstier than usual for me but kageyama is a big ball of angst. i would also like to formally apologize to people who've read beartown by fredrik backman because i may have taken a lot of inspiration from it
> 
> title is from "blackbox", by nana grizol.  
> (edit nov. 3rd i altered the title a lil' bit cause the lyrics were wrong...sigh)
> 
> see y'all at the end notes!

**i.**

Tobio doesn’t speak until he’s four years old.

It’s not that he _can’t_ speak. He makes sounds just fine; he screams, and groans in displeasure, and throws tantrums, and sometimes even laughs. But he doesn’t talk to anyone. Not to his grandfather, not to his sister, and not to anyone at school. He’s still young enough for it to not be a complete problem, because teachers and other kids just tend to assume he’s really, really shy, and he doesn’t bother correcting them. His family doesn’t force it upon him, either, which he supposes he should be grateful for. 

Well, when it comes to family—Grandfather and Miwa-chan are fine with it. Tobio may be very, very small, and be the sort of child whose heart is twice as big as his lungs, but he isn’t dumb enough to not know that, when it comes to his parents, it’s best to hope for something else. 

That’s a terrible thing to know when you’re four years old. Or at any age. 

Mother and Father are busy, busy people. Mother works as a correspondent for some fancy news company, which means she’s always travelling around for a story or another, and even when she’s there, she’s as good as not. Father leaves for work very early and comes back very late, and he never wears anything less than a cutting-edge suit. Their hours are odd and their patience is an afterthought when it comes to their two children, so when Grandfather suggests that maybe—just maybe, to cut them some slack—Tobio and Miwa could move in with him instead, the fight they put up is half-hearted at best.

Of course, Tobio is too young to remember that. The only home he knows are the creaking wooden floors that lead to Grandfather’s bedroom, and the colorful spreads of pillows and blankets that are always scattered around the living room, and the sliding door that separates it from the kitchen and makes a sound like woosh. His parents are people he sees on birthdays. 

Tobio isn’t really sure if they don’t know he hasn’t spoken yet, or even how much they’d mind if he didn’t at all. Grandfather calls Mother every Saturday to tell her about their week, and the talks never last longer than ten minutes, which doesn’t seem like enough to talk about something important. He thinks. Tobio isn’t really that good at telling time yet. 

The thing is, he just doesn’t particularly feel the need to speak. Miwa-chan and Grandfather can figure him out by the look in his eyes just as well as they would if he’d said anything out loud. He glares, and that means he doesn’t want to be here anymore and would like to go home. He blinks, and that means he’s listening. He closes his eyes, and that means he’s not.

It’s a simple enough system. Miwa sometimes gets annoyed with him, and she always says so with that _annoyed_ tone of voice. Where Tobio’s life is just like the sound of his heartbeat echoing inside his own head, she’s all fire. Miwa comes home from school with bruises on her knuckles and band-aids on her chin, pulls on her knee-pads and tapes on her fingers, and goes out again to volleyball practice. She’s like a summerstorm, all thunderclaps and heat, and her love for Tobio is just as loud. She loves him with all her teeth, with her fists closed tightly, and Grandfather only shakes his head gently and tells her to be more careful. As if.

(Such is the curse of eldest sisters. But younger brothers never really know that.)

Grandfather likes to joke that ever since Tobio learned how to crawl, he’s been trying to follow both him and Miwa to the volleyball courts. “Even before that, then!” he’ll exclaim, cheeks flushed and chest puffed, to whoever’s willing to listen. “Still in the crib, somehow he up and grabs Miwa-chan’s volleyball. Wouldn’t let it go until he fell asleep, and even then I had to pry it away from his fingers. Hands as strong as his heart, that one.”

“The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree at all,” people will usually answer, smiling, and Grandfather will smile back, because he doesn’t know yet. And Tobio will just frown and hide behind his legs, because he hasn’t learned that object permanence is a thing. 

There isn’t ever really a moment in Tobio’s life where he goes, _I want to start playing volleyball._ There isn’t any, _Do you think I’ll be good at it?_ or _Will it be hard?_ There’s just this: Grandfather is a volleyball coach, and Miwa plays for the girls’ team. There’s the sound of shoes squeaking against a glossy wood court, the dry sound of a ball hitting the ground, and the smell. There’s always the smell. Tobio will never quite know what it is, but it’s enough. At four years old, his heart is too small for his body, so the only choice he has when it comes to this game is to love it all at once. 

They’re by the side of the court. Miwa only has practices on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, but it’s a Wednesday now; they’re here because the boys’ team practices on the days the girls don’t, and Grandfather is _their_ coach, not Miwa’s. They’re also here because the forecast said it’s going to rain really hard at night, and Tobio is scared of storms, and Miwa is scared of seeing him scared. They didn’t want to be home alone when the water started to fall, especially because that would mean there’d be traffic, and Grandfather would take even longer to get there. So when class was out, Miwa went to pick up Tobio from kindergaten, and they walked back to her middle school gym; Grandfather doesn’t mind letting them inside if they’re not disruptive, and Tobio won’t be disruptive if he has a volleyball on his hands. 

It’s a simple enough system. 

In the background, Grandfather’s giving the boys from his team some _pointers,_ before grinning warily as he directs them to another _scrimmage._ Tobio doesn’t really know what all the words mean, but he thinks they sound pretty cool. Maybe he’ll try saying them later when he’s alone in his room, just to know how it feels. 

Miwa is in position, right in front of him. Tobio isn’t tall enough to reach the ball she tosses upwards, but his fingers keep twitching as he watches. For him, that’s as much as bouncing up and down in excitement.

“It’s just you and I now,” Miwa tells him, shoulders set. “But if this were a real match, and my team was counting on me to score, I wouldn’t be able to do it all by myself. I’d have to run up all the way to the net, then jump, then spike, but someone else would have to make the ball get to me. They’d set it. That’s why they’re called the setter.”

She points to her left, right behind Tobio, who turns around to follow her finger. There’s nothing there, so he’s glowering at her when he turns back, because he hates being tricked, but she’s not really paying attention to him. “So, say the setter is to my left,” she continues. “Maybe we’re not near each other. Maybe they’re all the way across the court, but the ball gets to where it needs to be. Volleyball is all about connecting, like those puzzles Grandfather likes to play. And the setter is like the center piece; without them, the picture is never whole. No one wins without the setter. So they set,” at that, Miwa tosses the ball above her head, and it spins like a mad comet, “and you _connect._ ”

She marks her words by spiking full on against the wall. The sound is so loud that Tobio hears a few of the boys yelp in surprise, then cuss her out, then look panicked when they see Tobio glaring back at them, all four years of age and stormy eyes. Brothers are meant to protect their sisters, he’s told, so he does that the best way he knows how. 

The ball rolls gently on the ground, all the way to Tobio’s feet. He bends down to pick it up, and something in his blood sizzles like lightning. He looks at the leathery surface, then at his sister’s wild smile and neat hair; looks back at the court and the net, where the boys are running a spiking practice. Everyone else seems focused on the attackers, but Tobio’s eyes are zeroed on the one tossing. Set, connect, spike. _Bang-bang-bang._

No one wins without the setter. 

Tobio tosses the ball to Miwa and says, “Again.”

Her eyes widen for only a moment, but she says nothing. Instead she does it again, and again, and again. Bang-bang-bang. Until Tobio’s eyes are dry and his head is heavy. Until all he can see is the exact moment when the ball leaves the setter’s hand and reaches the spiker’s. Is it a physical thing, when that happens? Does the person who set it also feel like lightning? 

He doesn’t know how to ask. Instead, Tobio watches. 

Miwa tosses the ball and spikes. If he were the setter, just at her left, how long before her run-up would he need to have tossed it so it reached her in time? He would need to pay attention to see how she would jump, from what angle, at what timing. If he’s just one second behind—if he’s just one millimeter behind—it won’t work. It won’t work until it’s absolutely perfect. It won’t work if it doesn’t take absolutely everything. So a setter connects to the spiker, but the spiker also connects with the setter. The _to_ and _with_ make Tobio’s head hurt a little, but his mind is whirling too fast for him to be stuck on it for long. Connect. Connect. Connect. There’s only one chance, one perfect moment of transcendence. 

And Tobio falls head over heels for it, because he doesn’t know how to not love something with everything he has.

Miwa’s hair is sweaty and sticking to her neck. Her chest is heaving as she turns to him once more, but the look in her eyes is clear. _I can still keep going, if you need me to._

“Again?” she asks, breathless, bending down to pick up the ball from her last spike.

Tobio shakes his head, and takes the ball from her hands. “I’ll set,” is all he says, before walking a few steps farther, to her left. Then a few steps farther, and a few more, for good measure.

Miwa grins at him, but she’s frowning a bit. “Are you sure you can toss from so far away?” 

Tobio only looks at her. His fingers are completely still on their grip, and his chin is up. “I want to see,” he tells her, “if I can feel it.”

She doesn’t ask what he means. He doesn’t say. Miwa takes a few steps backwards, so she’s nearly at the edge of the court, and then sprints. 

Tobio feels more than hears her steps, the vibration under his feet making his bones hum. He imagines the wall is the net; he imagines she’s trying to spike above a block; he sees her bend her knees and go up. Time stills.

He tosses the ball high above his head, and then sends it forward, using the tips of his fingers. Miwa hits it, and spikes. 

The moments that change our lives don’t always scream _ledge,_ but sometimes, there’s a hint. Between them both watching the ball hit the ground and roll away, then meeting each other’s eyes, something shifts. His sister’s eyes are laughing at him.

“Did you feel it?” she asks him, resting her hands on her hips.

Tobio puts his hands against his chest. No, not the hands—just the fingertips. He puts them there, and breathes, and hears the echo of his heartbeat in his head. Only it doesn’t sound like a heart at all. It sounds like something else.

_Bang-bang-bang._

“Yeah,” Tobio says. 

If he hadn’t, maybe he’d have become someone else entirely. If it weren’t for that single moment of connection, for that tug in his stomach. But nobody lives on maybes.

**ii.**

On the first day of Spring, Grandfather tells them he’s going to die. 

The park is alive and swaying gently in the sunlight, a quiet murmur. Tobio and Miwa are only a few ways away from their picnic spread, where Grandfather is sitting in a folding chair, reading his newspaper. Tobio is twelve now, and Miwa is nearly eighteen, but they’re tossing a volleyball from one pair of hands to the other, daring each other to go higher. His sister hasn’t played in a team ever since she started high school, but sometimes she still indulges Tobio when he asks her to toss to him. She just doesn’t go on runs with him and Grandfather anymore, and at night she’s too busy studying or working to practice in the backyard. It’s fine.

Tobio just wishes _Grandfather_ were going on runs with him, too. It’s been part of a tradition between them ever since he was old enough to walk on two legs; they’d run up and down the block five times, which is enough exercise because their home is right at the edge of a very steep climb to get to the other corner. But in the past few months, Grandfather has been going on them less and less. He doesn’t outright tell him no — just things like, _I’m tired today,_ or _I have to go run some errands, you go on, Tobio,_ and it never fails to set Tobio’s teeth on edge. Adults think kids can never tell when they’re being lied to. 

Okay, not necessarily _lied_ to. Just not being told everything. Tobio knows Miwa knows, because she’s older and nearly an adult, and Grandfather talks to her about grown-up things sometimes when Tobio’s not around. 

He’s not jealous. He just wants things to go back to normal. Is it too much to ask?

But right now, they’re playing. Tobio’s face is screwed up in concentration, but his breathing is even—he isn’t tired, and this is the calmest he ever is, with the rubbery feel of the ball touching his palms and then leaving them, just to come back a few seconds later. There’s a rhythm, a familiarity to it, but—

The ball drops, because Miwa didn’t send her toss long enough, even though she’s been doing it consistently for the past ten minutes. Tobio doesn’t growl at her in frustration, but it’s a near thing.

There’s a rhythm, and there’s a set of rules, but in volleyball, nothing’s guaranteed; it’s both the fairest and most unfair sport in the world. Tobio knows that this is what he’s going to do until he dies.

Grandfather is watching them from where he’s sitting, a content expression on his face. Well, Tobio is no master at reading people, but he _looks_ content. Maybe a little bit tired. Or constipated. Does that twitch in his eyebrow mean he’s happy, or just annoyed? They’re not that near each other — is he smiling or grimacing? How the hell is _Tobio_ supposed to know? Sometimes, he thinks everyone else must have flashcards for this sort of stuff. He should ask Miwa later. People are such hard, hard work.

The whole afternoon smells of cherry trees. 

“Tobio, Miwa,” Grandfather calls out, his deep voice a little bit scratchier than usual. “Come sit a while with your old Grandpa and eat something, will you? It would be very kind to let the ants feast on these honeycakes, but I didn’t make it for them.”

They mutter their own variations of _sorry_ as they flop down on the spread around the food. Grandfather makes a point to fold his chair and sit in front of them, so they’re at eye-level with each other, and Tobio thanks him for the food before trying to stuff two honeycakes in his mouth at the same time. He’s always some kind of hungry, these days; Grandfather says he’ll hit a growth spurt soon. 

(Tobio thinks he sounds very, very sad when he says it. But he’s never been the best at reading people.)

Miwa rests her chin on her hands, nibbling at her own food much more slowly. The years have made her grow very narrow and very thin, and she towers over Tobio and Grandfather both, these days. Despite having quit volleyball because she didn’t want to keep her hair short for the team, it’s at jaw-length now, with a fringe that covers most of eyebrows. People say she and Tobio have the same chin, nose, and eyes; Tobio would like to know how much of his face is only his, but that’s the sort of question you don’t really ask. 

“So, how’s school?” Miwa asks Tobio, wiping crumbs away from her mouth. “God, I feel like such an old lady asking that, but it’s been a while since I’ve had the time to ask.”

“‘S ‘cause you’re always working,” Tobio says, not bothering to cover his mouth as he chews. “But it’s just the usual. Class is boring. Volleyball isn’t. Last week I asked one of my senpais—the one I told you about, with the _amazing_ jump serves?—I asked him if he’d teach me how to serve, and he tried to punch me, but Iwaizumi-san stopped him before he could. Then on Friday I had that English test, but I think I flunked it.”

Miwa and Grandfather look at each other. Tobio feels like there’s something he’s missing, because immediately after that look, Miwa starts cackling like a maniac. Grandfather is also laughing, but he tries to be polite about it, covering his mouth with his sun-stained hand.

“Only you,” Miwa wheezes, slapping the ground, “would say _oh, someone tried to punch me,_ and then absolutely nothing. Like it was just a normal Tuesday. Holy — _heck._ ”

Tobio blinks at her. “It was a Wednesday,” he says. “We don’t have practice on Tuesdays.”

If possible, Miwa laughs even harder. Tobio doesn’t get the sense she’s necessarily laughing _at_ him, so he doesn’t tell her to stop. He reaches into the basket for another honeycake; Grandfather always makes enough for a small army, and they are _good._

“This boy,” Grandfather says, when Miwa has quieted down. “With the jump serve. I think you said his name was—Oikawa? Do you know since when he’s been playing volleyball?”

His eyes are very gray. Tobio used to think it was because Grandfather was so old, and eventually his own blue eyes would lose their color to time. He doesn’t know why he’s reminded of that right now.

Tobio shrugs. “A while. Iwaizumi-san has known him since they were very little, so they started playing together, but Oikawa-san is really good.” He puffs out a breath in frustration. “He’s really, really good, and he still practices more than anyone, but he won’t _teach._ It annoys me.”

Grandfather looks amused. “Maybe he’s not good _and_ he practices more than anyone,” he says, and Tobio feels chastised. “Maybe he’s good _because_ he practices more than anyone, and he doesn’t teach because he still wants to get better.”

Tobio frowns. “I don’t practice as much as he does, but I’m still good,” he flicks an ant away from his leg. “What’s he doing wrong?”

“Other people are not you, Tobio,” Grandfather says. A shadow passes over the sun, and the wrinkles on his face are stark. “He’s not doing something wrong, and you’re not doing something right. You’re both just doing it differently.”

“I don’t think he knows that,” Tobio says. “Maybe that’s why he’s mad. Maybe _he_ thinks he’s doing something wrong.”

Grandfather’s eyes glint. “Maybe. But anyone can play, so long as their hearts are as big as their lungs.”

At the word _heart,_ Miwa starts a little. The glance she shares with Grandfather is one Tobio would have missed if he hadn’t been looking for it; since he is, he sees her face pale. Instead of saying something, though, she takes a long sip of her cold tea. 

Finally, as if he’d been waiting for this, Grandfather turns to Tobio. He moves slowly; he takes Tobio’s hands slowly; he searches for something in his face slowly, slowly. Tobio hadn’t realized how wrinkled and stained his face is, from up close; it’s like a fruit that started to grow black spots from being picked up by too many people for too long a time. His fingers, as they touch Tobio’s wrists, are shaking just slightly.

“There’s something I need you to know, Tobio,” he says, and Tobio more feels his voice than hears it. “And I need you to be very, very strong.”

The world ends.

**…**

Eight months and three surgeries later, a phone call with their parents goes exactly like this:

Miwa is holding the phone on speaker. Tobio is huddled next to her, chin nearly on her shoulder. His hands are shaking.

Miwa tells their mother, “Your father is dying.”

Not Grandfather. She says, your. Tobio hears what she means—Kazuyo also belongs to you. Take it. Anyone who feels responsibility isn’t free. 

Mother says, _Oh._ It’s always _oh,_ like she’s just slightly disappointed, like Miwa just _had_ to trouble her with that. Like she’s the one being unfair. Tobio wants to scream, but instead he hides his face in Miwa’s neck. 

“And you two are planning on what?” Father asks them, harried. He doesn’t want to be having this conversation any more then they do. “You want—to move in with us, you want money, is that it?”

Like they’re a business deal. Typical. Tobio clings to his sister’s arm like he’s five years old again, and terrified of the dark corners of their home. Grandfather’s in the hospital, where he has been for the past four weeks, but Tobio still thinks he can hear his steps up and down the hall at night. Miwa has been preparing his bento every day for school, and leaving out money for him to get dinner if she has to work a late shift, and falling asleep on the couch whenever Tobio manages to make her sit down for more than ten minutes. 

These people on the phone are strangers. 

“Money would be nice, yes,” Miwa says, with no inflection on her voice. “I already have a job, but I can get another one. We don’t need the space, so we can sell Grandfather’s house and get a new place. You barely need to worry.” Then she takes a deep breath, and for the first time since Tobio can recall, her voice breaks. “I want—legal guardianship. Over Tobio. I’m not budging on that. He’s _my_ brother.”

Miwa is nineteen years old. Tobio is thirteen. Brothers are meant to protect their sisters, but sisters like Miwa would tear worlds apart for brothers like Tobio. 

He doesn’t realize until he’s much, much older, just what she sacrificed for him, in that moment. It would have been so easy for her to go out to university and get her own place, leave Tobio to move back in with their parents; to take their _generosity_ along with their dismissal, get the money she needed to get away from Miyagi and go to the big city, just as she’d always wanted, and Tobio would have stayed at school every day until it closed just so he wouldn’t have to stay all alone in a huge apartment made of glass and stone. It would have been very easy, but Kageyama Miwa would have never forgiven herself. 

Their parents half-heartedly ask her if she’s sure. If she thinks she’s ready to take on so much responsibility. Tell her that at this age, boys like Tobio are such a _handful._

Boys like Tobio would like them to fuck _off._

Miwa barely acknowledges them; just tells them to get the papers ready. She’s not budging on this.

Within two weeks, plans already have been made to sell the house. Tobio and his sister go searching for apartments, and though many landlords give them odd looks, it’s not terribly hard to find a decent one that fits their budget. It’s not very big, but they have two rooms separated by walls, if only one bathroom, as well as a kitchen that bleeds into the living room. There’s a balcony overlooking downtown Miyagi, all the corner stores glinting like golden stars from so far below; in a few months, it’ll be covered floor to ceiling in house plants of all sizes, because once Tobio bought one, he couldn’t really stop.

He still goes to school. Oikawa-san gets injured and so Tobio plays a few matches as setter in his place, even though he hears whispers from his coach that he “doesn’t seem to have his heart in it.” _Maybe it’s because of everything that’s going on at home…_

And Tobio thought _he_ was the one who’s bad at reading people. Volleyball is the only thing his heart is big enough to fit, right now. The feel of the ball against his hand, the smell of the court, the squeaking of shoes—that’s everything he has. Can’t they see that? It’s everything he has. 

Within a month, Grandfather is dead.

At the funeral, Tobio doesn’t cry, and neither does Miwa. He doesn’t like to hold hands but he stands so close to her that they’re just a mass of pale limbs and dark hair and darker clothes and blue, blue, blue eyes.

Miwa just pulls him closer. It’s them against everyone else, now. 

It’s a wonder either of them are still standing.

  
  
  
  


**iii.**

Afterwards, Tobio doesn’t feel much of anything. He goes to a grief counsellor because his coach makes him, and he takes a week off school to grieve, and he practices serving all by himself by the side of his building. It’s weird not having a backyard anymore, but not so weird that it gives him pause.

It’s not like he’s numb. His counsellor explained to him clearly that it was easy for people, especially as young as he is, to develop depression after traumatic events, such as the death of a loved one. She had a bullet point list of symptoms and everything.

It’s just that when it comes to emotions—they slide off his skin, like melting ice. Nothing sticks. He can get home from school and see that Miwa is there, which means she’s not working the night, and feel a burst of happiness; he can mess up a serve and get so frustrated he wants to scream; he can think of his grandfather’s kind hands and feel a pang of loss so big it swallows him up. But it never lasts long enough for him to savor it, or long enough for him to talk about it. Whenever Miwa asks how he is, he shrugs. Whenever Tobio asks how Miwa is, she says she’s tired. 

And then one time, during a practice match, one of the spikers—Kunimi—runs in Tobio’s blindspot, so he doesn’t see him in time to set the ball properly. It doesn’t fall to the ground, but it’s a near thing, and the surge of anger he feels is enough to leave him breathless for a few moments. He barks out, _Don’t do that anymore, don’t run where I can’t see you,_ and because Tobio is currently the guy-who’s-family-member-just-died, Kunimi just nods his head feverishly and says he won’t. 

But it happens again. And again. And every time someone throws a wrench in the system Tobio has figured out—be it for games, or school, or just his life in general—he starts to snap. He didn’t used to be the kind of person who screamed, but now his throat is raw more often than not. He’s a third year in middle school, so his kouhais were already terrified of him, but he makes it worse. He yells at them if they’re in his way, or if they’re not doing something like he wants it, or if they don’t reach his sets in time. If anything, _that’s_ what pisses him off the most. Trivial annoyances are one thing, but setting is another. Whenever he tosses and someone doesn’t get there in time, something in Tobio’s chest rattles.

Can’t they see he needs this?, he wants to ask. Volleyball is all about connecting. Can’t they see _that’s_ what he needs? 

Tobio’s never had many friends. He’s withdrawn, and quiet about anything that isn’t playing, and after his first growth spurt, he looks down on people more often than not. He’s heard the first years say he has a scary face, but it’s not like he can do anything about that. For all intents and purposes, his best friend is Miwa, and it’s not like she has any choice over that, either. Tobio might be socially inept, but he’s well aware of the fact that his sister gave up on the college life she’s always wanted and is currently working herself to the bone for him. For _him_. And what can Tobio give back?

When he sets, he thinks about many things. He thinks about the tips of his fingers, and the ball, and what everyone else around him is doing; he centers himself so he can memorize the position of everyone on the court, and how fast they’re moving, and how fast they can move; he sees the ball coming, and he tosses. At this angle, from this position, with this speed. 

He doesn’t even think that there might be a time no one will meet him halfway, because that’s a terrible thing to realize at fourteen years old. Or at any age. 

So Tobio keeps doing it, and he doesn’t stop. He knows his sets are perfect. He knows that if people just trust him and follow along, they’ll score. He’s sure they will.

He just wants to stand on the court for a little while longer. 

The world ends, but time passes. Tobio grows taller, until he’s nearly a full head taller than Miwa; he practices, and practices some more; when Spring comes and cherry blossoms fill every inch of the town, he keeps his windows closed. His sister has two stable jobs now: she works mornings at a nearby breakfast diner, and afternoons at a hairstyling shop, though she says she’d rather get a full-time position at the latter. Tobio only makes the mistake of asking her why she doesn’t quit the other one once. 

Then the junior volleyball tournament comes. 

(He would be lying to say that, after everything’s over and he’s done with middle school for good, he’d given too much thought into that orange haired captain. 

Tobio doesn’t _forget_ him. He’s sure he would recognize the boy on the street if he passed by, because he’s kind of hard to miss, no matter how short; the hair and attitude certainly compensate for that. But he never did catch his name, and the likelihood of them ever seeing each other again is pretty slim. There are many high schools in Miyagi, and only few of them are good ones for people like Tobio. And the other guy could jump, sure, and he was fast, but you could tell from a mile away he’d never played a real game before in his life. They’d never end up in the same place.

It sort of makes him—not sad, but wistful. Tobio recognizes raw talent when he sees it, and the guy had plenty to spare, which is why he went up to him and asked, _What have you been doing for the past three years?_

He hadn’t expected an answer. He hadn’t expected to hear, later, the same words he’d thought himself, over and over again.

_I’m going to stand in the court the longest._

Tobio told him that only the strong get to do so. He’d thought, _Huh, sure. As if._ But his heart was racing.

He doesn’t expect to see him again.)

They win against one team, then two, and make it to the quarter finals of the tournament. Tobio wants to win so bad it hurts, and he feels all of his emotions so heavily it makes his spine throb. Even if those emotions are also anger, and resentment, and shame—even then. Why the hell would he want to stop feeling like this?

He doesn’t make a mistake. He doesn’t miss. It’s just that no one else connects. 

When it comes to that—it never stops happening. He tosses, and there’s no one there. The ball is always hitting the court with no one to catch it and the sound is always echoing. The world never stops being pulled from under his feet. Tobio never stops feeling very, very small.

The other players tell him no one can reach his impossible tosses. Tobio’s coaches tell him he has talent, and plenty at that, but he’s not fit for teamwork right now. Maybe he should sit this one out.

He’s benched. The team doesn’t win without him, but they don’t lose with him either. 

Whatever. It’s not _his_ team. He doesn’t remember when he stopped referring to it as such. He’s graduating middle school in a matter of weeks, and he never has to see any of these people again; he’s not applying to Seijoh, because he does not want to see Oikawa Tooru again, and he knows no one at Kitagawa Daiichi has the guts to try and take the admission exam for Shiratorizawa. If not that, there’s always Karasuno—if Coach Ukai is really going back there, it might be worth it. 

It’s fine. It’s _fine._

He’s shaking.

Miwa didn’t have time to go watch the tournament because of work, so he walks home alone. She’s already there when he unlocks the door, and his sister takes one look at him and _knows._

She pulls him close, close, close, so that you can’t really tell where Tobio’s long limbs begin and her lanky ones end. His face is hidden in the crook of her neck and she’s running her fingers through his hair and humming soothing noises as if he’s a little kid, their legs entertwined, but he can’t bring himself to care. He doesn’t cry, but he shakes. He shakes, and whimpers make their way out of his throat like he can’t help them, and through it all Miwa just holds him and murmurs, “I’m sorry, _otouto,_ it’s okay, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Tobio doesn’t know what she’s apologizing for. He’s not sure she does, either.

**iv.**

He gets into Karasuno. 

Tobio isn’t disappointed, per se. He knew getting into Shiratorizawa was a long shot, considering that beyond being the volleyball powerhouse of their prefecture, it also is an all-around extremely strong school when it comes to academics. And Tobio has been called a genius before, but never outside of a court. 

Miwa says it’s because all his neurons are volleyball-shaped. He tells her to stop trying to be funny. 

And Karasuno is a good school. Maybe not the strongest—nowhere near other teams in Miyagi, and certainly nowhere on a national scale—but they had been, once. Tobio was only nine or ten when their team made it all the way to the Spring Tournament, in Tokyo, under the coaching of Ukai. He’d heard a couple other kids from his team in middle school commenting that he was going to make a return to Karasuno in the coming year, so he’d quickly written down the name as a possible option.

Then that third year—Sugawara Koushi, he’s cheerfully told—tells him Ukai-sensei had a heart attack right before summer vacation ended, and was to be off-duty indefinitely. Tobio only has enough presence of mind to not shout in his face.

He hasn’t done that since the junior tournament. He—he’s gotten _angry,_ sure, that’s pretty much his default emotion at this point, but he tries to tone it down the best he can. That means a lot of literally biting his tongue, going through some breathing exercises the grief counsellor had taught him all that time ago, and counting to ten in his head. Then he can behave like a normal human being, and all he says to Sugawara-san is, _Oh, that sucks._

Progress. 

That all goes out the window when he hears a screech coming from the gym door, where he’s been practicing his serves for a few minutes now, and sees orange. 

He does _not_ panic. He just can’t catch his breath for a moment.

It’s cliché to say that high school was supposed to be a fresh start, but Tobio was sort of counting on it. He’d never have to see the people who knew him in middle school again; everyone here would get to meet someone new. He’d work harder, stay more quiet, and be in a team. 

He just wants to play. 

And now this guy—fuck, what was his name again?—is someone who knew him back _then._ It doesn’t register in his head for an embarrassingly long amount of time that they literally met once, on opposite sides of a net, and out of all ten sentences they said to each other, six were insults. 

Tobio thinks all of that in the space of time between the ball leaving his hand and hitting the floor with a dull thud. The other boy is still standing there with his teeth bared, pointing a finger at him like he’s pointing at someone responsible for a horrible crime, and Tobio thinks that at least it’s a good thing he seems to be enough of a dumbass to not notice that Tobio’s brain essentially went into red alert mode for a full five seconds.

“Oh,” Tobio says. “It’s you.”

That makes the guy straighten up and cross his arms, glaring at him even harder. “You don’t even remember my name, do you?” he demands, and his voice is slightly squeakier than Tobio remembered it.

Tobio shrugs, bending down to pick up the ball he’d dropped. “No,” he says, curtly.

The guy flushes bright red, which kind of clashes with his hair. “It’s Hinata! Hinata Shouyou!” He takes a few sidesteps around Tobio, as if he’s walking next to a wild animal. “I can’t believe you didn’t remember my name,” the guy—Hinata—says, now slightly pouting. “I know we only played two sets together, but come _on!_ It was on the back of my jersey the whole time!”

Tobio blinks at him. “I only bother memorizing the names of opponents that are actually threats to me,” he tells Hinata. It’s been a good system so far.

Hinata hisses at him. 

“Oh, great,” says a voice from the doorway. They both turn to look at the newcomers—it’s Sugawara-san, who Tobio met earlier, followed by a guy with a buzzcut and slight snarl on his face, and another one, squared-jawed and dark-haired. Sugawara-san claps his hands together, beaming a winning smile at Hinata and Tobio. “You two already know each other. Makes our job so much easier.” He turns around and points at the other two, who salute them as they’re introduced. “The one who looks like a dad is Daichi-kun, and the delinquent is Tanaka. Try not to get along _too_ well.”

Tanaka takes one look at Hinata and Tobio and barks out a laugh. “Man,” he says, grinning. “This year is going to be fun.”

**. . .**

Having to play a three on three match to get accepted into the volleyball club isn’t all that bad, but having to play with Hinata is something else entirely. 

(And eventually having to be on the same team as that Tsukishima guy is another thing altogether. Anyone that says _Tobio’s_ an asshole has clearly never been in the same room as that walking stick in the shape of a boy.)

Look, Tobio’s not good at making friends, which means he’s certainly not good at keeping them, but he can, on occasion, get along with people. He’s even able to get through a civil conversation with Tanaka-san twice before Saturday arrives, which is the most he’s gotten with anyone for a while. But when it comes to Hinata, something just clashes. If there’s anything that’s the opposite of a magnetic attraction to a person—that’s what Tobio is feeling for him. 

He’s just so _much._ He’s loud and bubbly and entirely too excited at the prospect of anything, and Tobio catches him just looking out into the court as if he can’t quite believe he’s there, which would be kind of endearing if Hinata’s face wasn’t so innately annoying. He talks big, knows little, and is exactly the kind of person Tobio wants absolutely nothing to do with.

Which is apparently why life has decided that they need to learn how to work together. Because _life_ is also called Sawamura Daichi, and Tobio has enough self-preservation instincts to take one look at the guy when he’s mad and just do what he says. 

So they practice. They practice, and practice, and practice some more, every day till the match arrives. Tobio’s fingertips have started to grow new callouses. Hinata’s eyes are all fire. 

He never tells Tobio to stop.

He never tells him he’s tired, or that he can’t keep going anymore. He never tells Tobio that he’s crazy for doing so much, or that no one will ever be able to keep up with him. Hinata never pulls away first. Tobio has half a mind to imagine maybe he’s trying to prove something to him, but that idea is quickly discarded. With no small amount of—something, Tobio thinks, _I’m pretty sure he’d keep going even when I couldn’t._

It’s like that moment a thousand years ago when Tobio set a ball to Miwa and she hit it full on. It’s like the thunderclap of the court. It’s like lightning.

It’s exhilarating.

And Tobio doesn’t know how to _feel._ He and Hinata aren’t friends, nor exactly rivals, but not really strangers either; at most, they’re unwilling acquaintances who really don’t get along with each other. And even that doesn’t make sense, because when they’re on the court, they _do._

It’s the match-point for their team in the three on three match. Tobio is about to set, and in that moment, he thinks about a lot of things. He hears the squeaking of shoes and mentally draws a map of where everyone is standing on the court, be it on his side of the net or the other. Tsukishima is blocking to the left, Daichi is ready to receive on the right, and Yamaguchi is in between them. Tanaka tossed, and both he and Hinata are running up on opposite sides of Tobio. 

It’s difficult to explain what Tobio feels, then. To say he felt Hinata’s presence any differently than he was aware of everyone else wouldn’t be quite right. To say it was like Hinata was demanding to be seen would be closer. Before setting, Tobio usually thinks a thousand things, but at this moment—at this split second, all he can hear is Hinata saying, _I’m here._

Tobio tosses to Hinata. His hand meets the ball. _Connect._

The breath that chokes out of him is one Tobio didn’t even know he was holding.

It’s not that thing where you don’t realize how fast you’ve been running until someone tells you it’s safe to rest. It’s that you don’t realize it until you notice it’s been a long, long time of open road, and you have been very, very alone. Until someone else catches up.

_I promise you. If you get really, really good, someone even better will come and find you._

Tobio smells cherry trees, and wipes his nose quickly with the back of his hand. The game hasn’t ended. The memory of his grandfather has no place here. 

Hinata meets him halfway. 

The spike hitting the court sounds like a thunderclap. As Hinata reaches the ground again, as Daichi and Tsukishima gape, as Suga lets out a yelp, it all echoes, and echoes, and echoes. 

Sometimes, Tobio is hyperaware of everything. Every thread of his clothes seems to rub against his skin the wrong way, and the taste of food is overpowering and cloying, and sounds make his mind splinter and crack. The only place he has never felt like that is within bounds of a volleyball court. The only place where he has ever felt remotely human is when he is alone. 

He didn’t know it was possible to be so acutely aware of someone else, but if Tobio holds his breath, he’s pretty sure he can hear the sound of Hinata’s hand closing into a fist. He’s pretty sure he can hear his stomach gnawing. He’s pretty sure he can hear lightning crashes instead of the soft padding of a volleyball rolling away and hitting the wall.

Hinata holds both of his hands close to his chest, and his face is like the sun. Tobio feels his own fingers twitch.

After the game is done—after they’ve won, and are officially part of the volleyball team, thank _God_ — for some reason, a few of them end up walking together, meeting each other halfway. Tobio is nearly opening his mouth to ask what are the odds of all of them living near each other, when Suga stops in front of a convenience store, pops his head in through the door, and hollers out a hello.

Not _all_ of them are here. Tsukishima and Yamaguchi went their separate way the moment Daichi called out good work today, and he’s yet to meet any of the other second years (of which Suga has mentioned there are four, besides Tanaka,) so it’s only him, Tobio, Hinata, Daichi, and Suga making their way down the steep street away from Karasuno. 

As Daichi and Suga squabble with the store owner—whom they are somehow familiar with—Hinata bemoans to Tanaka about how his bus only ever gets to his stop after sundown, and it’s a forty-five minute ride before he has to bike the rest of the way. Tanaka looks slightly ill at Hinata’s very vivid descriptions of how he has to go up and down a mountain twice every day, because Hinata’s mother has always refused to let go of their farmhouse and get a place somewhere more accessible. Tobio feels tired just hearing about it. No wonder the guy’s stamina is absolutely ridiculous.

“We are victorious!” Suga exclaims, walking out of the store with a brown package between his hands. Daichi is a few steps behind him, shaking his head in fond exasperation. The store owner yells something that sounds remarkably like _Fuck off!,_ so they move away from the awning, and start walking together once more.

The brown package is, unsurprisingly, food. Tobio has no idea how a corner store that looks as run-down as this one has onigiris _this_ good, but he is definitely going to become a regular customer. Suga got enough for all of them, and vehemently refused to accept money for it. “You can pay me back with other things,” he says, smirking, and Daichi audibly facepalms.

Tanaka looks skeptical, even as his mouth is already stuffed full. “Like what?”

Suga raises a finger. “One favor, to be called upon at any time,” which sounds reasonable enough, but then he starts listing other things, all the while counting. “No questions asked, no matter the time of night, pre-made promises to not contact _any_ authorities under any circumstances, and that includes whatever vague yet menacing government organization you lot are in contact with—”

Hinata widens his eyes at both Tobio and Tanaka. There’s rice in his nose, somehow. “You guys are in contact with vague yet menacing government organizations?”, he asks, sounding amazed. “ _Wow.”_

“Shut up, dumbass,” Tobio answers.

“Man, I _wish,”_ Tanaka says, sighing, before taking another bite of his snack. 

And it’s so weird. They’re all walking together, and talking, and making jokes—at least, some of them are; Tobio just feels like an unwilling participant, and he’s pretty sure Daichi didn’t sign up for this either—and he’s hit with the sudden realization that he’s on a team now. These people are not other players. They’re his _teammates._

He feels, in spite of himself, like his heart has grown three sizes.

Which is why, in this split second where he doesn’t know how to help himself, he asks Hinata, “Oi, dumbass, why the hell did you spike with your eyes closed?”

He’s just—that’s bothering him. So he tossed, so Hinata spiked, so the play connected; it’s one thing to know that someone was there in time. It’s another to know that someone wasn’t even looking.

Hinata tilts his head at him like a confused bird. They’re walking beside each other, with Tanaka on Hinata’s left side, and Daichi and Suga just ahead of them. “You’re a setter,” Hinata says, as if it’s obvious. “You were setting and you said you’d set for me, so I just knew that the ball was coming to me. That’s all.”

Before Tobio can even come up with an answer to that, Suga goes, “That takes an awful lot of trust.”

He has to turn his head back to eavesdrop on their conversation, but Daichi is sort of steering him along so he doesn’t trip. Their hands are intertwined, but Tanaka, who’s the one that actually knows them, hasn’t said anything about it, so Tobio plays along. “For a spiker to just know the setter is tossing to them. And that’s good!,” Suga assures Tobio, probably mistaking the look on his face for something else. “It helps to confuse the other team, if the ball goes to someone else, but if it doesn’t—when people connect like that, it’s really, really satisfying.”

Trust. _Connect._

It always comes back to connection.

What is a sport but the people playing it? What makes a team? 

_I just knew that the ball was coming to me._

Tobio wants to grab Hinata by the front of his shirt and shake him until his teeth rattle. He wants to tell him that trust is the one thing he cannot give; that it grows and festers and no one can ever give as much back to you as you can give yourself away. That it shatters like glass and bleeds like blood, that it dies when, on a sunlit afternoon in the beginning of Spring, the one person that should live forever is telling you that they’re going to die before you even get the chance to become anyone at all. 

He only ever feels human when he’s alone.

(Maybe he shouldn’t have stopped going to that grief counselor. Miwa was sad when he did, but there’s only so much a sister can do. She’ll tear this world with her teeth if it means keeping Tobio safe, but she cannot rescue him. That’s his responsibility.

Anyone who feels responsibility isn’t free.)

Hinata punches Tobio on the shoulder. “Don’t back away, _Bakageyama,_ ” he says, glaring up at him. The effect is ruined by how he’s having a hard time to steer his bike, eat, and physically assault Tobio at the same time. “I’ll hit all the tosses you send my way, and more. There’s no point in beating you if you don’t push back. You’re not playing this game all by yourself.”

Daichi sighs, tilting his head to the sky as if in silent prayer. “Yeah, yeah, you’ll beat everyone one day,” he says, turning to look at them with a slight smile. “If your heart is as big as your lungs.”

He doesn’t understand people at all. But Tobio tells Hinata, once more, that he’ll be the one standing in court the longest, and Hinata doesn’t miss a beat in proving him wrong, again and again and again. 

(Someone even better will come along and find you.)

But that’s the story of what happens afterwards.

**v.**

“Oi, dumbass,” Tobio barks at Hinata, who’s already walking away. “You forgot to kill the lights!”

It took them _months_ of being in the team before they managed to get Suga to let them stay on the court after hours, with promises of of not fucking anything up and leaving everything in a better state than they found them in. That means Tobio and Hinata have a system, when it comes to cleaning up: Tobio will collect all the balls and put them back in their place (because the one time Hinata tried to do that, he got distracted and ended up spiking into the cart for a full fifteen minutes), take down the net, and lock the door when they leave; Hinata wipes down the entire court, and turns off all the lights so they don’t forget.

But the idiot is currently halfway through the courtyard, a bounce in his step, completely unbothered by Tobio’s glaring. “Do it yourself, asshole!” Hinata calls back, sounding way too cheeky. Tobio knew that telling him “ _nice kill_ ” would go all the way to his head. “My mom’s making katsudon for dinner! I can’t be late.”

“Shove the katsudon up your ass," Tobio says. Miwa would probably have a heart attack. “It’s called a _system_ for a reason.”

“Come on.” Even from far away, Hinata’s eyes are all fire. “I bet you can’t turn off the lights and catch up with me before I make it to the school gates!”

He’s already running before Tobio can even open his mouth. He glares at the back of that stupid orange head, then at the keys in his hands, then at the light.

But he kills them. 

Then, he races. He meets Hinata halfway.

**Author's Note:**

> haha yes hi how was that
> 
> i hope y'all liked it!!! i wrote this completely in the spur of the moment (by which i mean i didn't plan it at all and wrote it in seven straight hours) but i'm pretty happy with how it turned out! it's my first time writing kageyama's pov, so pls tell me if u think i did him justice. i love him
> 
> as always, comments and kudos are appreciated! if you want to yell at me, you can do that on twitter @bornfrombeauty ! see u guys next time!


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